Stop, Look, and See..

Main menu

Post navigation

Catching Up: Hermione Visit Part 2

Not being one to complain, we’ll skip all the details about my Internet’s provider’s spotty service this week and get right to a post that is about six days late.

Regular readers may recall my earlier posting about the midnight arrival of the L’Hermione in Alexandria, Virginia about two weeks ago. The vessel, is a replica of the French frigate that brought the Marquis de Lafayette to the American colonies during the Revolutionary War. Details on its background can be found in my post here and in Patti’s “Displaced Beachbums” post here.

The next morning, the public began to queue up for free tours aboard the ship.

Channel 7 was on the scene.

As were others who found the frigate a handy backdrop for themselves

The gangplank wasn’t ADA compliant, but no one was complaining.

Once aboard, you notice there are a lot of ropes everywhere.

Every rope (actually line) on the rigging has a function and a name, such as the “mizzen topsail halyard.”

There are two wheels, in front and in the rear (fore and aft, I believe).

Everyone wanted to know what was underneath these hatches.

Some more than others.

Some of the crew performed maintenance duty….

and others charmed their guests by posing for pictures….

and others kept alert for evil doers…

with the help of local security forces.

L’hermonie will be in Philadelphia June 25-28, then will sail for New York City. Details on the itinerary can be found here.

Thanks very much. Not too much research, but I must admit I don’t have any real knowledge of sailing terminology. But I did look up a bunch of nautical terminology to get a sense of it. When I ran across that example, I couldn’t resist using it. I’m a big fan, however, having seen some practice runs of the America’s Cup competitors in Valencia and one of the Cup races in San Francisco when they switched to the big catamarans. And yes, those hatches were a big magnet for the kids.

Thanks! That should be a great place to see her. I understand L’Hermione has the lead in the parade of Tall Ships on the 4th. That should be a fantastic spectacle. I hope you will be able to see that as well.

Beautiful post and great narrative. Love that you were able to shoot the mast and sail with no one around. And straight up the mast showing all the lines was amazing. I am working on your image for Stacy’s One Photo Focus right now. (It is your image, right? She only said Robin.) 🙂

Thanks Emilio. I appreciate the comments. Yes, that image is mine. I took it a few years back when I was testing out the difference between my Nikon D200 and new D700 and also practicing some Photomerge imagery. So the starting image is actually a completed photomerge rather than the usual single RAW Image. Given the assigned month, I thought it would be appropriate for the upcoming Fireworks day. Itr will be interesting to see if there are any submissions with some kind of editorial theme.

What a great day that was touring the ship! Your photos turned out fabulous as always ~ definitely worth the wait to see them. It was so nice to meet you and your wife. I’m still sifting through my photos and hoping to get caught up on this rainy Saturday.

Thanks very much. Yes, it was great fun, we really didn’t want to leave. The Internet has been up for most of today, but we still have no idea what is causing these intermittent outages. Hopefully, we’ll get it squared away soon.

Wonderful follow-up, Robin, and it was fun to find out that you actually had the opportunity to meet Patti! As for sailing terminology, beyond aft, foreward, starboard, and port (which I can never keep straight as to which side is which), all I know is “ahoy, there, matey.” 😉 Thanks for sharing the day’s events – great photos and clever commentary, and I got to visit the Hermione without ever leaving my chair!